


packed my bags and I'm headed straight into the storm

by capalxii



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Gen, Melancholy, Speculation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-20
Updated: 2015-08-20
Packaged: 2018-04-16 06:36:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4614957
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/capalxii/pseuds/capalxii
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Speculative fic based entirely on a set of spoiler photos from the series 9 finale filming. Details in the notes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	packed my bags and I'm headed straight into the storm

**Author's Note:**

> Photo shows Jenna Coleman in a waitress uniform, Peter Capaldi looking rough while carrying a guitar and a knapsack, and filmed at the same diner that was used in The Impossible Astronaut, complete with the same backdrop. Fic is based on the complete speculation that she's not actually playing Clara, but an echo or some other version of Clara instead. The notecards come from another comment by either Moffat or Capaldi that Clara writes him notes on how to behave. Title from Springsteen's Promised Land.

There's not much to this road, on a good day or bad. Dusty, quiet, eerie most of the time, in that way that roads through the desert always are. Mountains in the distance, sometimes tourists heading that way, or less often heading to the lake, sometimes people not trying to get anywhere in particular so much as they're just trying to get away. 

Mostly, though, the diner sits. Gas station next door, motel a few feet after that; a strange spot of civilization with miles of sand and rough all around them. Caught in a fixed point in time, there are cars out front older than most of the people who stop in on their way to someplace else, shiny like they've just been driven off the lot. Can't see the rust underneath, only cherry red paint jobs and mirror-polished chrome, somehow beating the dirt and the wind and the sun. It's a space filled with ghosts no matter how you cut it.

Sometimes it's ghosts who stop in. Sometimes it's people who look like they don't quite fit right anywhere at all; a dirty brown knapsack over one shoulder, a suit jacket that's seen better days. White shirt spotted and stained, dust ground into the thighs of dark trousers and scuffing black boots that look like they'd had a shine to them once upon a time. The guitar goes into the booth before the man does, wedged under the table and braced against the bench before he slides in next to it. 

“Afternoon,” she says. He's the only one in the diner, outside of the staff. Slow week. Not many people go up to the lake anymore. Reports of things burning out on the water, of people on a shore who disappear the closer you get to them. Ghosts, she thinks, or the memories the lake's collected, put on display for anyone who wants to see them. “What can I get you?”

“Water. And coffee. Please.” He doesn't sound parched as much as he sounds like he hasn't used his voice in a while. It's rough, but to her ears what's more telling is the way he speaks, each word pulled out of him like a splinter from under the skin. 

“Sure thing,” she says. “I'll give you a minute with the menu?”

“No need,” he says. 

He's rail thin, nearly gaunt, a shock of silver hair and sunken cheeks, and she's thinking from the look of him he'd like to see the menu very much but a glass of water's free and a cup of coffee's pretty close to it. So she nods, goes back to the counter, gets his cup of coffee going and by the time she goes back to him he's pulling something from inside his jacket. A sheaf of note cards, yellowed with age, ink bleeding into the paper and impossible for her to read from the angle she sees them. He's studying them intently, whatever they are, fingers tracing each line of text, brows creased in concentration. Something else on the table, an ID holder except it's only got a scrap of blank paper in it, set open like it should mean something. “Coffee,” she says. “Here's some cream, sugar's on the table. Sure you don't want a menu?”

“I said I don't-” He stops suddenly, glances up at her, shuffles his cards around. “No, thank you.”

There's a look back at the cook, Terry, who she could tell had been looking at her. Boss isn't in, he says with his eyes. A little bit of batter wouldn't be missed. She looks back at the stranger reading his notes. “Order of pancakes. Come on. Just a short stack. It'll be our secret.”

There's a look on his face as he looks down at his cards, like he'd expected it from her but was still surprised to hear it. Like he'd known but hadn't wanted to hope. “Thank you,” he murmurs, and it's with exponentially more sincerity than his last thanks.

*

He takes the pancakes slowly. She's on her phone, an odd sight in a place that seems stuck in the 50s, playing a game and pretending not to notice how he looks like he wants to inhale his food and another plate or two besides. Nothing but the local radio station playing songs that were probably already old when her gran was her age, and the sound of silverware scraping against stoneware. 

By the time he's finished, there's a storm brewing outside. Clouds are rolling in quick over the mountains, dark and churning, wind sweeping them closer and closer to their stretch of road. It'll pass, she thinks. They don't last that long out here. The stranger twists around in his seat at the rumble of thunder, looks out the door with a little bit more concern than she'd expected.

It's then she realizes the only cars out there besides hers and Terry's are the shined-up relics, the ones they keep for show or because they were there already and the place built up around them. The stranger walked in—there hadn't been a vehicle for hours on that road. Keep him here for a little while more, she thinks, and nods to Terry to relay her thoughts. Least 'til she gets off shift. Coffee pot in hand, she wanders over to him, refills his mug, asks, “So what's with the guitar? Not many venues around here.”

He's thumbing his note cards nervously, running the short edges against his fingertips, still looking behind him outside. “It's a weapon.”

Hand on her hip, she smiles down at him. “Oh yeah? 'This machine kills fascists' or something like that?”

At that, he turns back to her, pursing his lips before the corners of his mouth twitch up into a smile. “Yes,” he says, “something like that. Do you play?”

“Nah. I listen.” She cocks her head to the side. “You're a long way from home.”

The smile turns tight, then fades. “Longer than you think. But so are you.”

“Reno isn't that far,” she says. 

“Reno,” he says. He frowns, like he's processing what she said, not quite getting it but trying to. “What's your name?”

She points to her name badge with her free hand. “And you?”

The stranger smiles, shrugs. “Never really sure.”

“That why you carry all those notes?” she asks. 

“Something like that. You're very nosy.”

“Yeah. You wouldn't have answered if you really minded that.”

“Never said that I minded it.” He's looking at her, studying her with the same kind of intensity he'd had for his cards. He looks like he could trace his long fingers over her, all thick callouses and rough skin, and suddenly she's uncomfortable, but it's as though he realizes what he's doing because he stops. “Sorry. Did anyone ever tell you, you have a familiar face.”

“Guys tell me all sorts of things, doesn't mean I believe them,” she says.

“Do you ever wonder-” He's not looking at her anymore. He's fiddling with the cards, with the ID holder, inspecting his fork and knife. “Do you ever wonder about other yous? About, about if there are other versions of you, what they're doing.”

The diner sits in the middle of nowhere, a throwback to an era that had come and gone before the building had even been built. Sometimes she thinks about a life where she doesn't throw herself back with the job, where her hours outside of work aren't a blur and only half real. There are other hers, sure, ones who aren't ghosts that travelers remember as a novelty, ones who skip town and don't come back for a while. 

But those other hers aren't standing here, making small talk with a man who's nervously looking through note cards to find the right thing to say while Terry comes up behind her with a plate of eggs and hash browns for him. Boss ain't coming in with this storm. “Not really,” she answers softly. “You want any ketchup?”

*

Between bites, he keeps flipping through his old note cards. She's not sure what kind of cue he's looking for, what kind of response or question, but she's pretty sure she doesn't need him to say anything to either her or Terry, and so she goes back to her phone. It's only when he looks like he's getting up, walking to the door, that she stops pretending like she's not really looking at him. 

“You want anything else?” she asks quickly. When he shakes his head, she very nearly reaches out to grab him. “You can't go out in that storm. They're fast but they're ugly.”

“I'll be fine,” he says. He hesitates. Shoulders his knapsack, looks out onto the road. “Next town over's not for a few more miles, yes? A good walk?”

She always thinks that road looks like a scab on the skin of the land. She's not sure “good” is the right word for it. “It's not safe,” she says. Last ditch attempt—she points to his guitar. “That'll get damaged, even if you aren't.”

He looks down at it, smirks almost sadly, gives a little half shrug. “It's seen worse.”

“If your notes get wet-”

That's the ticket. His hand goes up to his jacket, right over his heart, where the cards sit inside his pocket. His face is haunted all of a sudden, as though she's touched on the worst possible thing to happen, and he swallows hard, blinking fast. 

With a sigh, she says, “I'll get you a sandwich bag for them.”

The stranger looks at her with that look on his face from earlier. Known but hadn't wanted to hope. Stuffs the cards inside the bag, squeezes it shut, shoulders his knapsack and squares up to the door. 

She can't stop him walking into the storm. But he turns before he goes, looks past her to thank Terry with a nod, says to her, “Do you have faith in anything?”

It's a strange question. She smooths down her uniform. “Not much to have faith in around here.”

He takes in the diner as though looking at it for the first time. It _is_ the first time, she realizes with a start. He'd only come in, sat down, read through his note cards and eaten. But he's looking at the diner like it holds some kind of secret. “I used to think that, too. Then every time I needed—“ He stops short. “You know, I've been in this place before.”

There's a look to him all of a sudden, something about him that tells her the storm doesn't have a chance. She doesn't want to believe it; worry's a more logical route, but she can't shake the feeling he's got more than just that guitar to hold him safe. “If you ever find your way back,” she says, resigned. “Look me up.”

He looks her straight in the eyes, a promise held in his own that she's not sure what to make of. “If I ever do, I will.” 

He opens the door, walks out; the wind carries into the diner until the door closes behind him. She watches him, dark figure on the dark road, walking towards the dark clouds on the horizon, until even the red of his guitar disappears from view. 

“You think he'll be okay?” Terry asks.

She nods, still watching even though she can't see him anymore. She's got a feeling about this one. Got ghosts of his own, but maybe they aren't so bad. She smiles, leans her head against the glass door, lets that feeling settle into her bones and says, “He'll be fine.”


End file.
